Is Julian Linnell an ACNA member on an Anglican Communion group?

"The Evangelism and Church Growth Initiative (ECGI)core group met in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia from 14 – 17 February 2011. The groupi was chaired by Bishop Patrick Yu from Canada, and hosted by Bishop Moon Hing Ng of the Diocese of West Malaysia. It included members from Melanesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, South Africa, Kenya, England and the USA, with staff from the Anglican Communion Office."

The Rev. Dr. Julian Linnell, Anglican Frontier Mission-USA is listed as a participant.

To be clear, I am glad that AFM is represented in that group, and I am glad the evangelism resources are being produced. Anglican Frontier Mission is one of those organizations that works with both TEC and ACNA members and although that might present some problems at times, I am convinced that we all have work to do related to evangelism and church growth and we can learn from one another. I am also impressed with Dr. Linnell's credentials and history.

The question is, is Dr. Julian Linnell a member of The Episcopal Church, and if not is he a member of the Anglican Church in North America? And if neither, then of what church?

I have found nothing to indicate that he is a member of the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh, where he was ordained, or the Diocese of Southern Virginia where he was a priest in Virginia Beach. My guess is that he transferred to Southern Virginia from the Episcopal Diocese of Pittsburgh and from there to ACNA 's Anglican Diocese of Pittsburgh after he took the appointment as director of Anglican Frontier Missions.

However, there is this note on the Anglican Church in North America website:

From HERE. "Earlier this year, The Rev. John Porter, rector of Grace Church, traveled to Turkey for an exploratory mission trip in the southeastern part of the country, near the sources of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. He was joined by The Rev. Julian Linnell, director of Anglican Frontier Missions (AFM) who is also a priest of this diocese, and DT Stoddard, a former Trinity School for Ministry student with over ten years of mission and church-planting experience among the Turks."

The way this reads, Dr. Linnell is a member of the Anglican Diocese of Pittsburgh. Whether or not that is true is hard to determine, but taken on face value it would appear that Dr. Linnell is not a member of a Church that is part of the Anglican Communion.

And, if he is part of ACNA, the Anglican Communion Evangelism office has appointed a member of ACNA to one of its groups, the Evangelism and Church Growth Initiative.

Given that TEC members of several committees have been dismissed or reduced to consultant status, it seems worth noting that ACNA has a priest on an Anglican Communion panel.

Again, as relates to the concerns of Evangelism and Church Growth, there is no reason not to have members of churches not part of the Anglican Communion as a member of this initiative. But it would appear that if he is from such a church, he is the only one the list who is. No one has bothered to note this, so perhaps he is not, in which case ACNA has misspoken. If he is, then the Anglican Communion Office ought to have noted the fact.

For a Church that often exemplifies the niceties of formal relationships and for an Archbishop who is so concerned not to have members of a church that is unrepentant of Windsor demands part of its ecumenical work, there seems to be no parallel concern about having members of churches not in communion with Canterbury and schismatic part of a working group of the Anglican Communion.

Then again perhaps Dr. Linnell is a priest in The Episcopal Church or some other church in communion with the See of Canterbury. Further information would be helpful.

24 comments:

On the one hand, I have the sense that someone or more than one in the ACO may be trying to sneak something by us in TEC that will be the first step in having parallel churches recognized as part of the AC here in the US.

On the other hand, I wonder if the folks in the ACO even know to which church the Rev Dr Linnell belongs.

Some might say, I'm a tad suspicious, and I would not quarrel with them.

If we're going to have non (recognized by the Anglican Consultative Council)-Anglicans on Anglican Communion committees, can we get some reps from the Metropolitan Community Church? Or do only anti-LGBT non-Anglicans need apply? :-/

Once the ACO appointed Mark McIntosh to ARCIC while maintaining the 'demotion' strategy re other appointments of Americans, it is possible that convoluted logic is the hall mark these days of ACO thinking ... I think one can raise that possibility whatever view one takes of the McIntosh appointment.

So, he's on the list of clergy released from license in the Diocese of Pittsburgh. Ergo, he's no longer a member of TEC. One would assume that he is a member of the ACNA, which does raise a few questions about the propriety of that situation. If he's not a member of the ACNA, it raises even questions of an even more serious nature.

Grandmere--I am sorry but I thought my point was clear. If progressives are worried about the ACO you can be very sure conservatives are, and have been for many moons. The ACO has in the past relied on TEC funds to operate (Jon Peterson's era).

Mark McIntosh is canonically resident in the Diocese of Chicago, has authored pro-Gay essays, was listed as a chaplain to Frank Griswold and then to the HofB, and is a member of TEC. Nothing prevents him becoming a member of the CofE, but he has not done that. Bishop Nichols' stand on SSBs runs precisely into the objections Kearon indicated were at the heart of restrictions on attendance.

Where we may agree is that ACO has gathered to itself powers that are not properly held by an adminstrative servant.

This is what happens when the Instruments falter and collapse. People constantly speak as though having them dead is a good. We will all be free and independent! No, it will simply be the case that power will shift to some other assembly given the vacuum.

If the Communion had never been that, but instead had been a 'Lutheran World Federation' of national churches, maybe the problem wouldn't end up being so extreme. But there it is.

Sam, I said nothing about Mark McIntosh being a member of the Church of England. I said he was licensed in the Church of England, meaning that he was permitted to perform priestly functions, an entirely different matter.

Where we may agree is that ACO has gathered to itself powers that are not properly held by an adminstrative servant.

Fine. We agree, Sam. Where we may not agree is that the Instruments have collapsed and that the covenant is the solution.

Sam, I don't know anything about Nichols. Regarding McIntosh, I find it puzzling that the person who made the case for the Episcopal Church's support of LGTB equality, is appointed to a committee, even as other members of TEC were reduced to consultant status on other committees. What makes him a suitable candidate as opposed to those who were removed? I'm confused.

Disagree with its logic, but the rationale for this action was spelled out by RDW. Most conservatives thought it was 'small beer' as against what should have been undertaken in respect of TEC.

So far as I am aware, RDW has offered no response or justification for having TEC and Diocese of Toronto members on the committees, in obvious contravention of his own rationale.

As for the ACO, they have done so. They have defended the actions. Are they the opponents of TEC? There is not much evidence of that. Kearon explains the decisions that are made and handed over to him. But in this case, he alone has responded to McIntosh and Nichols and not altered the membership.

I think one of the things that hounds the present authority structure is its inability to be consistent or to take advice and make changes in the light of that. This creates enormous suspicion. And so there is.

I don't want TEC out of the Communion. I want TEC to decide whether it wishes to exist in a genuine Communion, or have the courage of its convictions and press ahead with a cause the rest of the Communion has asked it not to pursue unilaterally. In the spirit of civil disobedience, let TEC act responsibly.

I also believe there are clear indications from a great many that this is a desirable path. The conflict arises within progressive circles themselves. Some want to stay and seek to make the Communion into something else. Others say, let us leave behind hose who do not share our views. I believe the second response to b more faithful.

It would also allow a peaceful disengagement, instead of the scandal of litigation an enormous sums of money being speant by TEC that could go to causes like Haiti.

Sam, although all progressives, as well as all traditionalists, are not on the same page as to what needs to occur, I cannot subscribe to your either vs or scenario because I see it as based on a falsehood that has never existed.

I want TEC to decide whether it wishes to exist in a genuine Communion

I think that we progressives wish to remain a part of the genuine communion that TEC helped start, not some fantasy communion that has never existed until this moment in the minds of traditionalists as you redefine what the communion has been.

press ahead with a cause the rest of the Communion has asked it not to pursue unilaterally

I find this an exaggeration of the facts on the ground. I see no evidence that this is a 1 vs 37 situation. Yes, there are primates of a number of provinces who have reacted to progressive theology in TEC and ACCanada in an all or nothing manner, but I do not see this is a unified stance, not even completely from within the provinces of the loud mouthed primates who demand their way or it's the highway.

Sam, I find you are guilty of the error of traditionalists of the 20th, and now 21st, Centuries. You lot live with and cling to a view of the past, of a traditional past, that is mostly confabulation, that has never actually existed beyond the realm of your own minds.